


Big Bad World: One (Mizutani: Zero)

by factorielle



Category: Ookiku Furikabutte
Genre: M/M, Misunderstanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-05
Updated: 2010-05-05
Packaged: 2017-10-09 21:59:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/92044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/factorielle/pseuds/factorielle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone knows about Mizutani's crush on Shinooka. Abe just wishes he'd say it out loud instead of following him around anytime he talks to her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Big Bad World: One (Mizutani: Zero)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [repiku](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=repiku).



The day Hanai comes to him with a worried frown and mumbles a question about Mizutani and Shinooka, the first thing Abe finds to say is "duh". It's been there forever, it just takes not being blind to know. Although, he amends privately, it might have been because Abe himself spends more time than average with their manager, planning and giving instructions re: the handling and feeding of Mihashi, and in these circumstances it would have been impossible not to notice that Mizutani seemed to be around way more often than necessary.

He doesn't care, and tells Hanai he shouldn't, either. It's not affecting the team dynamics, and while Mizutani sticks to Abe every time he has a conversation with Shinooka, it's still on this side of tolerable.

Until, a couple of weeks after the end of the Fall Tournament, their manager starts dating.

Abe has to concede that her performance remains perfectly adequate. Privately, he thinks she's wasting her time on the obnoxious jock on the soccer team who's one-sidedly declared himself Tajima's overall sports rival, but at least she does it in what free time she manages to find.

She's discreet about it, too, and it would probably have flown under the radar if Kinjo hadn't been in Sakaeguchi's classroom. Mizutani is on classroom duty the day the rumor starts (and ends, when Hanai forbids them from gossiping about Shinooka's private life in the clubroom). So Abe doesn't find it strange that Mizutani keeps following him around after that: either he doesn't know yet, or he's in denial. Surely even he wouldn't be so pathetic as to keep trying when she's already taken.

Two weeks later, after the two of them walk in on Kinjo with a hand up their manager's shirt, Abe has to reconsider.

Apparently, Mizutani really _is_ that pathetic, because he doesn't stop, even though she's clearly happy elsewhere, and now that baseball season is technically over (although training isn't), there are a lot fewer reasons for Abe to keep seeking her out. He grits his teeth for as long as he can, taking Mizutani's incessant chatter as an exercise in patience, until one day he can't anymore.

It's the most innocent of encounters, really, Shinooka waiting until after practice to give him back his notes for some classes she missed, and while Abe talks to her he notices Mizutani, already halfway to the bike rack, staring wistfully at her. The moment she leaves, Abe pounces on the idiot.

"You might as well get it off your chest, you know," he snaps. "Everyone knows anyway."

Predictably, Mizutani looks horrified. "What? Everyone?"

Abe shrugs. He'd like to say he knows that for sure, but it's not like he has hard data on the question. Maybe Mihashi is still oblivious, after all.

"So just do it. You'll feel better afterward. And what's the worst that can happen?" He'll get rejected, but that's a given. Sometimes you have to open the wound so it will heal, blah blah blah.

He didn't think it was possible for Mizutani's eyes to get wider. Clearly, that was a miscalculation on his part. "I could get beaten up and sent to the hospital."

"Nobody is stupid enough to do something like that." Though for all he knows, Kinjo might very well be. "Not to you," he amends. Or any member of the baseball team, if he wants to keep dating Shinooka. Her loyalty to her team is too strong.

His argument seems to get through a little. "Really?"

_It's training in communication with Mihashi_, Abe tells himself. _Keep calm._ "Really," he says as reassuringly as possible, and even manages a bit of a smile.

Mizutani shuffles his feet. "Uh, can you close your eyes?"

That's not going to be much help, because she's probably way further than Abe can see by now, but whatever. He shrugs, closes his eyes, and wonders how long he has to stay standing there like a moron.

As it turns out, just long enough for his idiotic classmate to--

To--

Abe can't even wrap his mind around it until after he jumps back, wide-eyed and trying not flail his limbs. "You, you...!" is all he seems able to say, and at least Mizutani has the decency to flush in embarrassment.

"I'm sorry!" He throws his hands up in apology. "I was, I didn't, I mean--"

Abe wants to yell at him, he really does: both for not making sense and for the... _kiss_. But it's getting kind of late and he needs to look over Shun's homework, on top of checking Mihashi's over the phone. "It's fine," he says grudgingly.

"Really?!"

_Don't knock the moron in the head. Don't even ask what he thought he was thinking. You don't have time to waste on this crap._ "Yeah, sure, whatever. I'm going home."

And so he does, and takes a short bath after dinner and asks Mihashi about his homework while writing corrections on Shun's, and he falls asleep immediately after crashing on the bed.

He's changing his clothes in the clubroom the next morning when there's a commotion somewhere at the door. In the ruckus he hears a strange call of "go easy on the Care Bear Stare this early in the morning, will you", and suddenly there's a heavy thing on his back, with tentacles wrapped around his shoulders.

"Good morning, Abe!" Mizutani calls cheerfully.

Abe has to make a conscious effort not to elbow him in the junk, but hey, at least maybe now the idiot will stop staring after Shinooka like a lost puppy.

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from [this song](http://www.jonathancoulton.com/songdetails/Big%20Bad%20World%20One) by Jonathan Coulton, which is a Mizutani anthem if ever there was one.


End file.
